Hard disc drives commonly include a rigid housing that has a base deck and a top cover. The rigid housing encloses a variety of internal components. The components include a medium or media for storage of digital information that is mounted on a spindle motor assembly. The components also include an actuator assembly that is used to position one or more recording heads along the medium to read and/or write information to particular locations on the medium. The recording heads are mounted to a suspension of the actuator assembly. The suspension maintains the recording heads adjacent to or in contact with the surface of the medium. A voice coil motor is used to precisely position the actuator assembly.
Hard disc drives are sensitive to particulate contamination. Particles frequently enter hard disc drives during the manufacturing process or are generated by components within the disc drives. These particles can damage disc drive components and can negatively impact reliability. For example, particles in a disc drive may come into contact with the surface of the medium. This impact can cause physical damage to the surface resulting in the data stored in the impacted area being lost. Particles may also become lodge between a recording head and a recording medium. This can result in unstable recording head to recording medium spacing or a crash of the recording head into the recording medium.